Sporting Madness

Unsurprisingly, this is one of the first pictures that pops up for "Clay Travis". The Deadspin story about Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o's oft-referenced girlfriend being illusory has spurred plenty of interesting reactions  on what this means for the media , story verification procedures , his draft stock and much more. Unfortunately, it's also stirred up some of the worst detritus of the Internet. A case in point comes from C'lay Travis , who's covered college football for Deadspin, AOL FanHouse (RIP), and his current Outkick The Coverage site, plus hosts a Nashville radio show. What's Travis' take on this complicated, layered story that's still coming together? The only plausible rationale here is that Te'o is gay : This is actually the only story that makes any sense at all. And even if it's true, Te'o will probably deny it because, unfortunately, football players aren't exactly the most welcoming of homosexual...

Rick Rypien's death at 27 is a tragic story, and one that's resonated with a lot of people. Hundreds headed to Rogers Arena for an impromptu memorial Wednesday , while his teammates in Winnipeg mourned treatment programs and the role of fighting came to the surface. Information on what exactly happened to Rypien is still scanty, but for many of us, his death brought back memories of athletes who battled depression and wound up taking their own lives, such as Kenny McKinley and Dave Duerson . We don't know yet if depression led to Rypien's death, but it's played a major role in the deaths of others. Before Rypien's death, Sports Illustrated 's Pablo S. Torre wrote an excellent piece in this week's magazine on the suicides of Duerson, former San Jose Shark Tom Cavanaugh, former New York Yankee Hideki Irabu, American Olympic skier Speedy Peterson, former Duke basketball captain Thomas Emma and Austrian Olympic judoka Claudia Heill, and how they raise ...